Jonathan Back, who until now has been co-head of ECM together with Ng, will leave the team and take up a new role focusing on corporate development and strategic projects involving the bank in the region. JPMorgan is said to be looking at various potential strategic investments and sources say Back, who has been one of the key players in building JPMorganÆs ECM franchise in the region over the past five years, has been looking to do something different for a while.
In another significant move, Arjun Khullar will transfer from JPMorgan Cazenove in London to Asia to take up a new position as head of Southeast Asia ECM, based in Singapore. JPMorgan is aiming to create a capital markets centre in Singapore to strengthen its coverage of Southeast Asia and India, the bank said.
Khullar, who is an Indian national, will become a key part of that effort, JPMorganÆs head of international capital markets, Viswas Raghavan, told FinanceAsia yesterday.
ôWe want to build on the momentum that we are seeing across the board and we want to allocate more resources to regions where we see activity,ö says Raghavan, noting that JPMorgan currently ranks number one in both cash equity and convertibles in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) as well as in the US. In Asia, it is number one in CBs and among the top five in cash equities, he adds.
Khullar has been with JPMorgan Cazenove and its predecessor firms in London for the past 12 years and before that with Jardine Fleming in Asia. He has a good track record of helping companies to list both on the main board and on the Alternative Investment Market (AIM), which together with his local India knowledge makes Khullar the ideal person to help bring more Indian companies to AIM û a recent trend that JPMorgan believes is here to stay.
ôWe are seeing a lot of inquiries from Indian companies about coming to AIM for funding as small- and mid-cap companies are intrigued by the pool of capital,ö says Raghavan.
Khullar, who is a managing director, will be reporting to Kester Ng and will move to Singapore in the first week of April.
Meanwhile, Steve McLean, a vice president, will be moving back to his native Australia after three years with the EMEA financial institutions group (FIG) in London. He will re-join the ECM team in Sydney, reporting to Matt Roberts, head of ECM Australia.
McLeanÆs departure will in turn free up a position on the Europe FIG team for Stefan Weiner, who has expressed a desire to move back to Europe after five years with JPMorganÆs ECM team in Hong Kong/Asia. An Austrian national, Weiner is also fluent in Russian. He will report to Ina De, head of ECM coverage for financial institutions.
In addition, JPMorgan says it will combine the equity-linked and corporate derivative origination functions in Asia under the leadership of Achintya Mangla, who is currently head of equity-linked origination in the region. The new structure will be similar to how the bank is already set up in the Americas and will see all its volatility products being gathered under one roof, making it easier to offer clients the most suitable solutions, whether they are looking for financing or a hedging product.
Mangla will report to Ng, while Miodrag Janjusevic, who is currently head of corporate derivative origination, will report to Mangla. JPMorgan said they are also in the process of hiring more people to this team.
Rounding out the new appointments, Rupert Fane will take on an additional role as head of ECM coverage for Middle East and Africa in response to what the bank describes as ôunprecedented levels of activityö from this region, particularly the Middle East. Fane will continue in his current role as head of international equity syndicate, which he assumed when he left Hong Kong last summer.
Fane, who is a managing director, was previously co-head of ECM in Asia together with Jonathan Back. When he departed for London, JPMorgan hired Kester Ng from Merrill Lynch to fill the gap.
ôTasking someone of RupertÆs calibre and seniority to lead our ECM effort should help boost our market share,ö Raghavan said in the internal statement.
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